NZ house prices, credit growth need more cooling, S&P says

The New Zealand housing market needs to cool further and credit growth needs to slow to remove risks to the wider banking system, Standard & Poor's says.

In an update on New Zealand's banking sector, the credit rating agency noted risks from house price inflation and credit growth had stabilised this year, with the third round of the Reserve Bank's loan-to-value ratio restrictions biting into demand for residential property investor mortgages and banks tightening their own credit since late 2015. While that was a start, S&P director of financial institution ratings Nico de Lange told a........